Kelly Hignett

Leeds Beckett University, Cultural Studies & Humanities, Faculty Member

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My research interests relate to twentieth century central/east Europe, including: state-sponsored terror, repression, imprisonment and forced labour; show trials and political persecution; criminality, social deviance and dissent; the evolving relationship between state, society and experiences of ‘the everyday’ under communism; women’s experiences of communism and nationalism, state-building and identity construction in modern central/east Europe. More generally, I am also interested in methodological approaches to life writing, personal narratives and oral testimonies; histories of imprisonment and forced labour and the history of crime on a more broadly comparative and transnational basis.

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Papers by Kelly Hignett

Women’s experiences of repression in Czechoslovakia, 1948–1968

Decoding Albanian organized crime: culture, politics and globalization

Journal of contemporary Central and Eastern Europe, May 4, 2017

The Prediction and Control of Organized Crime: The Experience of Post-Soviet Ukraine by James O. s> Finckenauer Jennifer L. Schrock (review)

The Slavonic and East European Review, 2007

Spy Game Diplomacy

New Eastern Europe, 2012

Enemy of the State

Women’s experiences of repression in Czechoslovakia, 1948–1968

Women’s Experiences of Repression in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, 2017

Transnational Organized Crime and the Global Village

Routledge Handbook of Transnational Organized Crime, 2012

Women’s experiences of repression in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe

Journal of Baltic Studies, 2020

previously projected. The authors also conducted new archival research on various veteran societi... more previously projected. The authors also conducted new archival research on various veteran societies in East Prussia and Lithuania. After the war, veterans formed communities and actively fought for their recognition, integration, and social welfare. In Germany, disabled veterans were compensated by the state, while in Lithuania a functioning system for their compensation was established only in 1930 (438). When implemented, however, this system discriminated against the Great War veterans of the Russian Army, favoring instead the disabled veterans of the Lithuanian Army. As a drawback of the volume, I would mention the way the authors have chosen to describe the actual war experiences of civilians in the first section. Much of it is spent trying to extrapolate the numbers of various social and ethnic groups that suffered from the war, instead of focusing on their lived experiences and the social and emotional impact of these experiences. To conclude, the volume represents a significant conceptual, thematic, and empirical breakthrough in the studies of the Great War in the Baltic region. Its comparative perspective, the focus on various communities of war experience, its scope of research, introduction of new themes, and archival materials makes it a must-read for any specialist interested in the history of the Great War in Lithuania and East Prussia. Although the book was published in Lithuanian, the authors have published the major findings of their research in a collection of articles in English (Acta Historica Universitatis Klaipedensis, vol. 34, 2017). There is little doubt that the quality of the volume has established Klaipėda University as one of leading centers of World War I studies in the Baltic region.

Policing economic crime in Russia: from Soviet planned economy to privatisation, by Gilles Favarel-Garrigues

Global Crime, 2011

A fearsome heritage: diverse legacies of the Cold War

International Journal of Heritage Studies, 2010

... 297 COLLEEN M BECK, HAROLD DROLLINGER and JOHN SCHOFIELD Index..... ... 153 Figures Photograp... more

Fearing the East? European Immigration in the UK.

New Eastern Europe, Jul 2013

Transnational Organized Crime and the Global Village

Europe: Then and Now (Review)

'Narkomania': Doing Drugs Behind the Iron Curtain - paper delivered at BASEES/ICCEES Congress, Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge (April 2013)

This paper will explore the evolution of the domestic drug market in communist Eastern Europe. Du... more This paper will explore the evolution of the domestic drug market in communist Eastern Europe. During the communist era the East European regimes deliberately downplayed the nature and scale of drug abuse and it was only during the final years of communist rule in the 1980s that they attempted to acknowledge or address drug abuse as a serious social issue. Drawing on evidence from several countries across the former communist bloc this paper will demonstrate that not only had a thriving domestic market for the production and supply of illegal drugs behind the iron curtain been well established by the end of the communist period, but that there was also clear evidence of the establishment of international drug trafficking, across national borders and beyond the ‘iron curtain’. These developments provided a strong basis for the expansion and internationalisation of the drug trade in East Central Europe during the 1990s, following the collapse of communism throughout the region.

'We had to become criminals to survive under communism!': Conversations About Crime in Communist Eastern Europe - paper presented at BASEES 2012, Cambridge, 1 April 2012.

This presentation draws on my experience of conducting interviews with individuals in East Centra... more This presentation draws on my experience of conducting interviews with individuals in East Central Europe (the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland), which formed part of a critical enquiry into criminality and crime networks during the latter decades of communism (1960s-1980s) and the early post-communist period. A range of individuals were invited to discuss their observations, personal experiences of and subsequent reflections on crime during the late communist era. From these disparate insights an interesting, complex, and richly textured narrative emerged. While most individuals were surprisingly open and candid about their own involvement in illegal activities during the communist era, at the same time a number of 'coping mechanisms' were adopted by interviewees, seemingly in an attempt to both minimalise the inherent contradictions evident in the communist system and to justify and 'normalise' their own behaviour within it. This paper will address some of the ethical and legal issues which researchers must confront when exploring and documenting individuals' involvement in illegal activities, while also arguing that personal accounts make a valuable contribution to research in this area; enhancing our knowledge and understanding of the dichotomy that existed between ideology and the realities of everyday life in communist Eastern Europe, and illustrating many of the ways in which this dichotomy influenced popular perceptions of legality, criminality and changing social values in the region.

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Crime in Communist and Post-Communist Eastern Europe

'Survivors and Connivers': Crime and Criminal Subculture in Socialist Society

A common claim made by successive Soviet and East European leaderships was that conditions exacer... more A common claim made by successive Soviet and East European leaderships was that conditions exacerbating criminal behaviour would ‘wither away’ as states advanced further along the path of socialist construction. This notion was seemingly supported by persistent propaganda trumpeting the low level of criminality in socialist states compared with the capitalist west. In many respects however, these states masked rather than solved their crime problems and a high level of hidden crime was concealed within and facilitated by the socialist system. Indeed, by the 1970s, virtually every citizen was engaging in various ‘petty illegalities’ and informal economic exchanges, something which came to be considered as normal and morally acceptable everyday behaviour. Popular participation in certain criminal activities was not only accepted by a majority within society but was also increasingly condoned and even actively encouraged by state authorities. Whilst many turned to petty crime out of necessity; as a ‘coping mechanism’ to overcome the economic failings of the planned economy, for others it also represented civil disobedience and subversion, a form of protest against and resistance to the regimes in power.

This paper will first consider the ways in which ideology influenced attitudes towards crime in the socialist block, before considering the widening gulf evident between the ‘official line’ promoted by the state and the reality of everyday life, by exploring the development of the criminogenic environment that fostered a clear criminal subculture within socialist society during the latter decades of communist rule.

Comrade Criminal? Crime and Criminal Subculture under Communism

The Changing Face of Organized Crime In Post-Communist Central and Eastern Europe

Debatte: Journal of Contemporary Central and …, Jan 1, 2010

In the twenty years that have passed since the revolutions of 1989 and the collapse of communism ... more

Co-Option or Criminalisation? The State, Border Communities and Crime In Early Modern Europe

Global Crime, Jan 1, 2008

... conditions (particularly the declining threat from the Ottomans to the East) and moves toward... more

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